


i am made of stories (and they all belong to you)

by andrea_deer



Series: the stories we share, the people we love [2]
Category: Black Sails
Genre: Angst, John actually talks about himself, John's POV, Lots of Angst, M/M, Mentions of past abuse, Possessive Behavior, So much angst, Some Swearing, a bit - Freeform, and generally horrible childhood, but vague ones, journey to savannah, some pinning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-20
Updated: 2017-09-20
Packaged: 2019-01-01 02:53:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12147066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andrea_deer/pseuds/andrea_deer
Summary: But in this moment, on their voyage to Savannah, when it all felt like a torturously prolonged goodbye, he rebelled against his own plan and refused to let James go unmarked. Every minute he spent with the man was tainted with the presence of Thomas Hamilton, it seemed only fair to return the favor.





	i am made of stories (and they all belong to you)

**Author's Note:**

> Sequel to [the stories within me (want to be held by you)](http://archiveofourown.org/works/10697370), I think one could read them separately, but they're intended to be read together.

The stories about Thomas Hamilton were so alive in John's mind that jumping to the conclusion that the man himself was alive felt way too easy. And yet, when Max mentioned the plantation, mentioned the members of rich families that needed to disappear to avoid shaming their relatives... The thought _"just like Thomas"_ came unbidden and powerful. And no matter how much John wanted to dismiss it, he knew he wouldn't be able to. 

His life taught him in many and various painful ways that human lives are not stories. Tragedies don't create heroes they simply break people and those who survive the pain thrown at them will be tested again and again. There'll be no prize, no peace, no sense in their suffering. There was no storyteller who carefully lined up the events of John's life to bring him to where he was now. To prepare him for it. He was not prepared and every pain he suffered was as common as bread and without any deeper meaning. 

And yet it seemed that a small part of him was still eager to believe it all because when the man he sent to the plantation confirmed that Thomas Hamilton was in fact held there, all John could think about was how miraculous it was that this information fell into his hands. If he never was parted from Flint and the rest of his men, if they hadn't captured Max, if he wasn't curious enough to ask... Even if all of this happened but someone else sat in his place, someone whom Flint trusted just slightly less and never told them about Thomas and their story. This scrap of information seemed like the long-lost schedule of L'urca de Lima. Useless scrap of paper to the unknown eye, but an impossible treasure to those who recognized it for what it was.

It almost seemed like a _sign_.

And a small part of John, the same part that watched his Captain rage along with the fury of the storm, watched his broken spirit during the doldrums and thought this man to be capable of draining them all as the life escaped his own spirit... That part thought that maybe it was a sign, and maybe, just maybe, sometimes lives are just like stories. Not all of them, but just those few most tragic ones.

And no matter how much he wanted to fight it, it seemed he had to play his part or Flint's war will rage and kill them all. John heard him talk and sometimes he believed him, maybe indeed their rebellion would shake enough of the new world for London to pay attention, for England to care and pay notice. Actually, John had no doubt that if anyone could rage a war to shake the whole New World, it would be James Flint, what he always failed to see was how they could all survive it. And why should he care if the whole world noticed and shook at the war they started if they'd be dead? The dead didn't care about the winners of the war. They could be dead heroes or dead enemies. Usually, they were just countless nameless dead that few or none remembered. The stack of their bodies built the history that meant nothing to them.

-

John made his way down to the hold where behind closed doors and cast in iron staid the most feared pirate of the New World. John watched him closely as he closed the door, cutting them off from the rest of the crew. 

James looked back at him with little force. There was no anger in his look, his rage - if still in him at all - was hidden deeper now. 

He'd fought when they brought him on board. John knew for a fact there had to be bruises on his ribs from where Israel had struck him. It was obvious in the way Flint's breathing hitched on every deeper inhale, even as he refused to be treated. The skin on his wrists was was raw with bruises he got the first day when he fought against his restrictions, when he raged and strained the chains keeping him in place as he yelled at John, calling him a traitor and a coward. Useless son of a bitch with no honor, who did not deserve to be spit on by his wife. John didn't want to restrain him but knew him well enough not to take the chance.

His shouts stopped then as John closed the door behind him. He didn't let anyone else go to Flint knowing far too well how easily and successfully the man could manipulate and trick others and not willing to risk it, but still, he was too angry to actually go to him himself. Rackham said nothing, but the next day he kept shooting John looks as they both sat in the captain's cabin.

"I never knew you for a man holding his tongue," John finally snapped.

"Well, we hardly knew each other for long," Jack replied easily and John nodded in agreement.

"Fair enough, but I somehow doubt that's the problem here."

"It simply seems odd to me, you went to so much trouble to ensure him being taken alive and now what? You plan to starve him to death?"

"I will bring him food. It is not your problem."

"No, of course not. But it seems quite troubling to you and it seems a bit overly paranoid to avoid simply sending one of your man to him... You hardly can think he will convince Hands so easily to aid him."

"I think sending Hands to him is like asking for bets to be put on which one of them will come out alive and I do not enjoy placing bets with such uncertain come out."

"At the risk of tempting fate, I feel obliged to point out you might be overestimating Flint slightly."

John shook his head, unwilling to discuss it with Rackham who never sailed with Flint, who barely joined them in their war, he doubted Rackham of all people would be able to understand it. At the moment perhaps Rackham was even right, but the ending John wrote for this story was too uncertain and still flickering in his grasp to tempt it so.

"Be that as it may, I'd rather be overly cautious that ruin the compromise we've established," he allowed and ended the fruitless discussion by leaving the room.

Now as he entered the hold in which Flint was held he realized the angry shouts didn't end simply because Silver left the room last night. They ended as the anger drained from Flint, his resistance fading. He looked at John resigned and betrayed.

It was not the look he had as they argued on the Skeleton Island, it was the look he wore when they were locked in a cage in the Maroon Camp and it crumbled John's resolve. 

John worried something might go wrong, his man perhaps betrayed him, something happened to Thomas before they manage to get there, something will happen to them on their way. He felt their story wild in his hands as he tried to force it to stay on the track he put it on and he still failed to trust it to run its course in the proper order. This is what stopped him from telling Flint directly what he had in mind, where they were taking him, but as he watched him, caged and hopeless once again, he knew he could no longer go on without telling him. Without opening one last time a new way for the man who believed there were none left.

John put the tray of food by Flint's side, where he could reach it with his cuffed hands. Few pieces of bread and cheese and a cup of water, it was hardly a captain's meal, but it was food and after the time they've had it should be tempting enough, but Flint didn't reach for it. Perhaps he would if Silver was stupid enough to bring him a knife with it, but he would never trust his Captain to give up that easily.

"You should eat something. There are still at least two days of travel ahead of us."

Flint nodded but made no move to reach for the food.

John sighed, sitting on a upturned barrel opposite his Captain and wondering how exactly to tell him what their goal here was. 

"Is this the moment you finally let me in on the mystery of where are you taking me?" Flint asked dryly and John smiled bitterly at that.

"You gave up on the notion that I'm simply going to kill you then?"

Flint shrugged.

"Considering your actions, your words, it would be the most sensible thing to do, but I fail to see what would be the point of transporting me first for several days. Unless you want to hand me off to someone to do the deed in a different fashion."

Flint's gaze turned accusatory and John frowned trying to follow that thought while also grabbing the cup and pushing it towards Flint, because the grate of his voice stirred the guilt in him even further.

Resigned Flint accepted the cup and slowly raised it to his lips, taking a small sip as leisurely as if he was perfectly fine and not perched after over a day with nothing to wet his mouth. John wondered if the stubbornness gave Flint something to hold on to.

"I am not going to give you up to England or the Navy, you're not going to hang if that's what you mean. I- uh, I figured out an alternative end to this situation. To you. You see Max and Jack managed to convince Madame Guthrie in Boston to help their cause, help them deal with Rogers, take over Nassau, bring civilization to it, but on their terms."

Flint scoffed, but John ignored him.

"I'm going to talk them into a compromise and truce for the Maroons. The war will end without any more bloodshed."

"She will never forgive you. You're not only taking the fight from her, you're taking it from her people. You're putting yourself in the place of so many men before you trying to own them... She will never see your cowardice and arrogance for anything else and-"

"Maybe so," John interrupted. "Maybe she will hate me until the day she dies. I don't care. I will stand by my actions for the simple fact that she will live for much longer than she would've otherwise. I'd rather have her alive and hating me than loving me and dying by my side. And if I have to live with the two of you hating me to the core from where you will lead your lives than so be it. If you two refuse to see that you'd be dead if I did not stop you, if you think it preferable... I'm sorry, but I can not agree to it."

"It's not for you to agree or not!"

"It is now," John replied. His voice calm and cold. "You gave me this power and I refuse to use it to put you into the ground."

"That's the plan then? Ship me off far enough to avoid coming back? How far are you willing to sail?"

"You will not come back."

"A prison then? You think that is a preferable fate to dying?"

"I doubt any prison could hold you for long if you didn't want to stay there."

"And why the fuck would I want to stay caged?"

John wet his lips, taking a deep breath in. 

"When we captured Max I asked her what she planned to do with me, when she almost managed to capture me after Hands dragged me from the beach. She told me of a plantation run by a man in Savanah. She apparently learned about it from some of her spies in Port Royal. It is a secure place, but relatively peaceful. Its goal focused on keeping its prisoners out of the gaze of society rather than punishing them cruelly."

"You've been planning this for weeks."

"No. No, but don't you see? When she mentioned its mostly used by the wealthy families to staw away their shameful relatives I had to know more. I hardly could tell you anything without finding out more! So, I sent my man to find out before I gave you any hope."

"Hope? For what?"

"For Thomas Hamilton being held there."

"Thomas is dead."

"No," John said slowly. "He is not."

He barely managed to duck before the metal cup went swinging at his head. His Captain snarling and reaching for the plate to toss it as well just as Hands walked in and taking in the situation slammed a bat against the base of Flint's head, knocking him out.

"No!" John ordered as Hand's lifted the bat for another hit. "Don't hurt him. And bring him some more water, just don't talk to him if he wakes up. I will come later to explain his situation further."

"Why the fuck you need to explain shit to him? It's not like it matters if he wants to go or not."

"It matters to me."

John held Hands' gaze before the man rolled his eyes and left the hold, John following slowly behind him, throwing one final look at his Captain. 

-

He waited until the nightfall to calm down and give Flint enough time to calm down himself. He collected another cup of water and a plate with the stew the crew had for supper. He vaguely wondered who the hell was Jack's cook, because they were clearly wasted at the fighting ship.

When he opened the hold Flint seemed to be dozing off, his breaths shallow, his lips dry. John watched him for a moment before making his way closer and standing directly before him, passing him the cup to take.

"We both know you're awake, just take the damn cup."

"I could grab your throat instead," Flint said quietly. His voice hoarse with disuse and lack of water. His gaze penetrating John to the bone.

"And it would've given you shit," he brazed off, refusing to bow down now. "Just take the damn cup."

Finally, Flint accepted the offering and drunk steadily until he drained it. 

"If you will stop being horrible about it, I will bring more. Now eat something."

He passed the man his plate, surprised that he only seemed to throw him a mocking glance over that fact that he's been given possibly the bluntest spoon John could find. But he made no comment and he started to eat. John stood awkwardly in the middle of the room thinking he might just as well leave and almost turned to the door before it hit him that this is exactly what Flint wanted. This was a reason behind his sudden obedience.

He grabbed the cup back and went just outside the door to the hold, where a bucket with lukewarm drinking water was standing and filled the cup again before going back inside the hold and closing the door behind him. 

Flint threw him an annoyed glance over his meal, but he did not break the silence.

John wisely waited until he ate more, worried another meal will get wasted and by the time they get to Savannah he will be bringing Thomas a bag of bones instead of a long lost lover. It seemed odd how the man seemed so close to him regardless of the fact that John never met him, only had the stories about him and coming only from one man, who was still so utterly biased.

The stories could keep the memory of someone alive, but it was incredibly hard to learn any true picture of someone from them. No one knew it better than John. Long John Silver, the pirate king. No one who still called him Long John Silver knew him, few people calling him John Silver in the first place could claim to know him at all. But the memory of him, his story is so much more than it was before joining the Walrus crew, when he was a nobody. 

It suited his needs then, but now he knew painfully well that if he died then - in a scuffle in some port, out in the sea with another crew, sneaking out from a con he barely managed to pull - he would die, his body would be tossed over and no one would remember him. Maybe someone would consider him "that weird fellow, who got killed", maybe if he died in a truly gruesome way he would end up being a story to share over the fire, but no one would ever know him and cherish his memory. He never even thought he'd want such a thing. Would crave it so desperately.

For someone to know him, to remember him. For his memory to be enough to transition someone's whole expression in one of fond memory. It felt like a punch, when he saw Flint talking about Thomas Hamilton for the first time, when they both sat near the recently buried treasure. The face he knew in sadness, despair and about ten types of anger. That face calmed and smoothed down as its owner lost himself in a ten-year-old memory of another man. 

It hit John that no matter how much he thought he changed Flint. How much more of him he saw. This was something belonging purely to Thomas Hamilton and everything in John fought to do what he knew how to do best: steal it. Take this emotion, this devotion, from the dead man who he doubted ever deserved it, but even if he did, he certainly had no need for it now... 

Now the tables have turned once again. Thomas Hamilton was alive and Long John Silver was about to fall back into the land of stories he crawled out from. Making John realize that for a moment there, he made the worst mistake a liar could make - he fell for his own con. Long John Silver fell still like a new coat, not quite fitting right yet, but John felt himself growing into it. Seeing it as something he could achieve, someone he could become. Failing to remember it was not a new stage of his life, it was just a new round of the lifelong game and Long John Silver was as fake as John Silver or John, regardless of how much more gain it promised him.

"I think I was thirteen, or something like that, when I called myself John the first time," he said, breaking the silence.

Flint stilled for a moment, the hand about to raise the spoon again, freezing briefly at the edge of the bowl. He didn't look at Silver, though John mindlessly stared as Flint returned to eating. Methodically scrapping the bowl for the last few spoons of the stew.

"I was working in the field for a summer with a group of laborers and a kid wanted to join and claimed he was a friend of John. There were like three Johns among the current and still remembered workers, they easily shrugged off the issue of which John he meant. And while the kid was an utter shit of a liar and probably was actually a friend of one of the Johns, it occurred to me it is a good name to use." John drunk from his own cup, pausing briefly and ending weakly: "Then it kind of stuck."

Flint still held his silence, though now the bowl was empty and loosely held in his hands, while he looked at John with no expression as if unsure how to react. As if he was wondering why John was telling him this now and John was forever glad he was not actually asking about it out loud, because he feared he wouldn't know how to answer. To admit that even now, as he's shipping his Captain away to give him to another man and part their ways entirely, even now a small part of him is trying to tie his life closer to Flint's, wanting to always get closer, get even more under the Captain's skin. Be as close as to become a part of this man or take over him so completely that he would become a part of John.

It was a craving he never fully knew the full strength of, but now he felt himself succumbing to it. Wanting to left mark on Flint, make this permanent as much as it was possible to make anything permanent in their way of life. But he wanted this... whatever it was growing between them before, to leave a permanent mark on both of them. 

He wanted to remember James Flint as a whole and as every detail creating the man, the way he sounded, when he shouted orders and how different he sounded when he shared his tales. He wanted to remember with all his senses, keenly as ever, the James Flint he knew. Had him imprinted on his very soul like a brand of marking he will never shake. And he wanted Flint to forever burn with the imprint of him. Over a decade from their parting John wanted for Flint to be able to recall stupid details like how he disliked the sea or what he hated eating, what he looked like when he smiled, every change in his face that occurred through the months they spend together. He wanted Flint to have such a clear, ever-present picture of him that he would never doubt himself while recalling his memory.

He wanted for him to see and remember him as clearly as he ever did Thomas Hamilton, but more. 

This dark possessive feeling was new as well. Or perhaps not. Perhaps it was simply another form of it. John can remember seeing gold or jewels, or the luscious life he could never afford and thinking: _I want it. It should've been mine_. And when it rose again, in small, peaceful moments they've had to themselves, when John listened his Captain talk about himself, about his life... John's stomach tagged with the vicious envious dark feeling that every denied beggar and every thief knows as well as breathing. _I want it_ , he thought then, watching the soft expression of love and longing on James' face. _It should've been mine._

He knows it's never going to be, not in a way he briefly considered when they were back on Walrus when Flint told him he can only properly say dirty things in Spanish and John dreamed of those words being whispered feverously into his ear between panted breaths as their bodies came together.

But in this moment, on their voyage to Savannah, when it all felt like a torturously prolonged goodbye, he rebelled against his own plan and refused to let James go unmarked. Every minute he spent with the man was tainted with the presence of Thomas Hamilton, it seemed only fair to return the favor.

"Silver was a new name I only took, when Mr. Gates broke into the hold I hid in," he said after a long silence, lost in thought, because Flint couldn't recall him properly if he only knows the lies he showed. 

Flint knew more about John than probably anyone ever did, but it was still so very little. Few truths so far in between the lies it would've been hard to make a story out of it. And a longing, small part of John wanted for James Flint to be able to one day, years from now, sit by the fire, his skin glowing, his hair looking deeper and redder than they do in the sunlight, and recall utterly pointless details about John. The real John.

The real John who always disliked the sea. Who always wanted to be a few steps ahead of everybody. Who learned ages ago how to talk himself out and into trouble. Who grew up for a few years in a foster home for orphaned boys, though he never knew if he was in fact orphaned or simply abandoned. He wanted Flint to know not only Long John Silver, but the other Johns and even Juan de Silva, perhaps even Sam Thicke.

Perhaps even Solomon Little.

"Where did Flint came from?" John asked suddenly into the silence.

James was still looking at him as if he was trying to once again figure him out. He looked tired and confused, there was still dried blood lost in his beard and splashed over his chin and John thought vaguely that they will need to clean him up before they give him back to Thomas. He focused his thoughts on that, on the practicality of when it would be best to bring in the water and would they need to fully uncuff Flint and would it be better to wait until he wanted the bath more so he might be less likely to kill them all if given half the chance.

He wanted to speak more, he wanted to show James his true self or at least the facts from his past, but he couldn't just keep on speaking, he thaught himself to always keep it out of his mind and silent. He told so many stories to cover up all the facts, it's hard to just dig into it and talk.

He licked his lips nervously.

"How did you come up with the name? I admit, I assumed it could've been a completely random choice or something you overheard and took as your own, but as I grown to know you better I realized there is very little random chance in anything you do."

"Is that so?" Flint finally broke and asked dryly, looking around as if to point out that he certainly had not put that plan in motion. John didn't comment that if he never told him about Thomas, they wouldn't be here, because for once in their shared lives - this was not about Thomas Hamilton.

"Lots of random things happen to you, I will admit that easily, but with your actions and decisions most of the things have some meaning behind them."

"Interesting theory," mocked Flint stubbornly, but John had no words of his left, so he simply waited in silence.

He wondered if he stayed here long enough someone would come and find him. He hoped not. He was exhausted beyond any experience and his whole body was sore, while his heart was still too busy breaking at an extremely slow pace. Somehow sitting here in silence was still preferable to the maddening situation on the deck, where people still expected him to play his role as if nothing happened.

"It's from a story my grandfather told me," Flint finally said, surprising John and not looking at him in the slightest. "My grandfather was the one to raise me, he was an old fisherman and whenever mood or drink struck him he enjoyed sharing all those sailor tales that were often weird and probably fully made up or mixed in his memory with time. Once he told me a story about a man who climbed out of the water and onto his ship when my grandfather was on late watch in Boston harbor. It was a complete stranger who admitted he fled after being accused of killing another man. He said his name was Mr. Flint. He didn't say much besides that. Eventually, he asked my grandfather for a little more rum from below, but by the time my grandfather came back with it - the stranger was gone. No one heard anything about him later on, nor was anyone looking for him or talking about his supposed crimes. The man seemed to appear out of nowhere and disappear back into the sea."

"That's what appealed to you, wasn't it?"

Flint looked at him carefully, seeming startled as if he forgot it was not one of their usual chats on board of Walrus. He nodded slowly.

"You really hoped to shake him off, didn't you?" John asked with a small relief.

Flint swallowed but did not reply, sensing the way John wanted to trap him into agreeing. John let him avoid it for now and continued down a different path:

"But isn't taking them off the general problem with disguises? They're always somewhat alike us and the longer we wear them the harder it is to say if they're becoming more like us or are we starting to resemble them."

Everything in John screamed to change the subject again, to distract Flint, to avoid his questioning eyes and thoughtful expression. To hide himself, to protect his identity, his life. He bit down on those urges, digging his heels in and waiting. Leaving the perfect opening to be taken, still uncertain how well he will handle it if Flint took it, how badly it would hurt if he didn't.

"Personal experience speaking?" Flint finally asked with a snarl and John quietly sighed in relief. 

"Very recent one, actually," he admitted. "Never before I held one for long enough to have much experience to speak of. I'm quite certain there were a bunch of names and personas I kept for less than a day. For a few months that I spent in London, I switched my story every other day. Partly to avoid confrontation in case anyone was looking for me, mostly for fun. Some of them were positively outrageously unbelievable."

A flitting smirk on James' lips was probably the best encouragement he was going to get.

"Then again, I was not more than twelve then. And had a rather vivid imagination."

He stumbled over another block in the story. He was twelve, yes. And he created some outrageous stories, that was true. He was also starving so badly that year and he let a lot of things happen to him to keep warm in the winter. That was all he remembered, really. How he ate moldy bread he found, how other bodies were crowding on him in the bed that was so blessedly warm he didn't care about anything else and how he told a rich lady he was an exotic prince who got kidnapped by the pirates and needed to pay for the ticket home. She gave him more than he expected, he was lucky enough to find one with a sense of humor that day. He didn't remember other times he told this story, but he knew they didn't end so happily.

"How a twelve-year-old Spaniard made his way to London, anyway?" Flint finally asked and Silver caught the question as if it was a rope tossed to him overboard. The hot feeling in his stomach tightening his muscles. The excitement of uncovering himself was soothed with the welcoming touch and his skin primped with anticipation as if he was baring his body before this man's touch and not his story before his mind.

He was painfully aware how much in this moment he wanted to know how different those situations would feel. And that he was never going to find out.

"Half-Spaniard, actually," he said with a fake calm he didn't feel. "Or so I was told."

Flint rose his eyebrows questioningly. "How so?"

And John told him. Everything he could think of, everything he remembered, everything that didn't stop his tongue, didn't block his words in his throat. Everything he could give was Flint's. It wasn't a long story and he doubted it will be enough to be remembered by, but it was all he had left to give.

**Author's Note:**

> I FINALLY FINISHED THIS SEQUEL OMG. In my defense, season 4 kinda fucked up my plans. (Bless it.) Now, in this steady rhytm in about 6 to 12 months I might actually finish it off with the last planned fic. Or I will leave it in the angstdom it fell into. Who knows. 
> 
> Thank you for reading! Find me on [tumblr](http://lordnochybaty.tumblr.com/) if you wish :)


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